Siti Aisyah Panatik

Job demands and work-related psychological responses among Malaysian technical workers: The moderating effects of self-efficacy

Abstract Job design has long been found to affect the work-related psychological responses of employees, such as psychological strain, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions, but scholars have begun to question whether established theoretical relations regarding job design continue to hold given the enormous changes in the nature of work during the past two decades. It is also increasingly recognized that individual differences affect work behaviours in substantial ways, but few studies on work design have investigated these differences. We addressed these concerns with a two-wave longitudinal study among 245 technical workers at a telecommunications company in Malaysia, a country that has a collectivist culture and a high power distance between managers and subordinates. We examined the moderating effects of job control and self-efficacy on the relationships between job demands and employee responses. The results failed to support the job demands-control model, as job control variables did not moderate the impact of demands on employee work-related psychological responses. However, self-efficacy moderated their impact on psychological strain (although not on job satisfaction or turnover intentions). Our findings provide insight into the moderating effect of self-efficacy, and suggest that practitioners interested in reducing psychological strain should consider making efforts to increase self-efficacy among employees.

Self-efficacy as a determined factor for knowledge sharing awareness

This paper discusses the concept of self-efficacy as a factor that can moderates knowledge sharing among academics in public universities in Malaysia. The partial results of survey are presented from the actual study. This paper aims to determine the level of knowledge sharing awareness and to identify whether the approach is associated with demographic factors (designation, gender, working experience and academic field). Participant included 725 academics from 20 public universities. The level of awareness to share knowledge was at moderate level. The One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) revealed that there were significant differences on the knowledge sharing awareness across designation, working experience and academic field. Significance was not seen between knowledge sharing awareness on gender.

Manipulation of Safety Training Practices on Organizational Safety Performance: An Evidence in Malaysia’s Automotive Industry

This paper aims to investigate the role of safety training practices to safety performance in Malaysia’s automotive industry. This study adopts a non-experimental type research which employs questionnaire as the method of collecting data. The measurement tool undertaken in the data collection is Safety Performance Scale that developed by Wu et al. (2007). A total of 696 employees from Malaysia automotive manufacturing and assembly plants are selected as the respondents of this study. The selection of respondents is made using systematic sampling design. Data of the study are then analyzed using canonical correlation analysis. The finding of the study highlights that safety training practices plays a significant influence to an organization’s safety performance (r 2 = 0.631, p <0.001).

Building Communities of Practice and Knowledge Management at Malaysian Muslim-Dominated Organisations: Toward a Research Agenda

This research will try to highlight on Communities of Practice (CoP) and how CoP will offer a productive solution for improving knowledge and Knowledge Management (KM). The relationship between individual and social learning has received a great deal of attention from the organisation theory perspective. Based on previous literature, the social constructivist perspective challenges the traditional idea that learning takes place in individuals’ minds or in organisational systems and structures, where it starts with the assumption that learning occurs and knowledge is created mainly through conversations and interactions between people. Another interesting point that will be highlighted in this research is the exploration and understanding of the processes and dynamics of CoP (synonym with brotherhood of Muslims) in Muslim-dominated organisations. We found the dearth of empirical research into how social interaction and learning is actually created in religious community; and in addition for this research we also look upon the CoP issues from Islamic perspectives.